The help author has to concentrate on the content and need not to worry about different output formats as it would be handled by RoboHelp itself. They have to simply select the output formats and generate with required options.

How to change default Language setting?

RoboHelp 10 is shipped in English, French, German and Japanese locales but the help can be generated in many more languages.

Help authors many a times face such scenarios when they have to generate the output in multiple locales.

When you create a new project the defaultProject language is same as that of installed RoboHelp.

This implies that the same language is used by RoboHelp to show any text/LNG Strings in the output apart from main authored content spelling checks, and dictionaries and in generating smart indexes. Besides help content there are a lot of default text elements in output runtime user interface of help systems like table of contents, index, glossary, search, no results found etc. This is a big list of such strings which can be there in any help system commonly called LNG strings.

But if you want a different language for these then use can select it from the Project settings dialogue. For example if you are using French RoboHelp and want Spanish language settings then you can go to “File > Project Settings” and select Spanish from the Language dropdown. Refer to image below:

RoboHelp provides fine control over language setting and besides project users can define language for a particular topic or even for a particular paragraph.

To change language setting of a topic open “Topic Properties” dialog and change the language from dropdown in “General” tab.

For changing the language for a particular paragraph open the “Paragraph” dialog and define new language from here.

Language defined at the paragraph level takes precedence over language defined at a topic level. Language set at the topic level takes precedence over language defined at a project level. Language defined at the project level can never take precedence over language defined at paragraph level. If multiple languages are defined at the project, topic, and paragraph level then the effective language as per the precedence is used for dictionary or thesaurus association and for spell checking.

So it is interesting to note that while we are localizing Adobe RoboHelp in 3 languages, we are enabling our users to create help with ample support in 32 more languages.

Going a step further -> Editing LNG strings for customized needs

While as part of RoboHelp localization we provide LNG strings in 36 languages, users can also modify these strings for any language to suit their needs.

The LNG strings can also be edited for any customization needs. This can be done from File > Project Settings > Advanced button > LNG file tab

All the strings are listed in the LNG File tab under different sections like WebHelp, AIRHelp etc. The desired string can be edited by selecting and clicking on Edit button. In this way help authors can also edit the LNG strings to customize existing strings.

How to create multilingual WebHelp from RoboHelp?

Create a project in RoboHelp.

Create separate topics for each language.

Create separate table of contents from above topics for each language.

Also create separate index and glossary for each language

From the Single Source layout (SSL) pod open the WebHelp and click on content categories.

Create new categories by clicking on New button and rename it after any particular language.

Each content category is now shown as a separate language. Select it and set the language specific Table of Contents, Index, Glossary and language.

Now generate WebHelp and open it in browser.

Select any particular language from the category dropdown.

Please note that the system you intend to open the localized help should have the locale specific code pages installed.